What would Beyonce do?

Fashion Editor

Beyonce and her Destiny's Child co-stars giving their all at the Super Bowl halftime show.

Now put your hands up… did you watch Beyonce’s halftime show at the Super Bowl? Even if you don’t like music, football or America, you need to down tools and hightail it to YouTube. She was spectacular. Just a couple of weeks after the star spangled lip-sync-gate at Obama’s inauguration, Beyonce had a point to prove. This was the super star at her most professional and fabulous.

Watch it back and you can see the hours and hours of rehearsal that sit behind each of her routines. There’s no phoning it in with Beyonce. You could feel the blisters on her feet. See the tightness in her hamstrings. Every dancer, pyrotechnic and flaming guitar was synched to a hair flip, a leg kick and a bootie drop.

Boom. Smash. Boom. It was Beyonce Bowl.

Star of the show ... singer Beyonce performs at the Super Bowl. Photo: Getty Images

Halfway through the performance her band mates from Destiny’s Child - Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams – were rocket launched into the Super Dome from under the stage like Tributes in the Hunger Games. Or crumpets out of a toaster. Beyonce would have made them practice that move at least a hundred times. And they would have done it. Why? Because excellence begets excellence.

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There’s something about Beyonce that makes me want to be a better woman. To strive harder. Be more disciplined. Stay focused. And I don’t think I’m alone. She’s an anomaly in celebrity land. Watching her doesn’t make me feel anything other than positive. I looked at her leather clad, super-toned body on stage and it made me want to switch-up my work-out. Run an extra kilometre. Add Crazy In Love to my gym playlist. Conversely, most other A-list bodies can make me feel inadequate and unmotivated. When I watch the Victoria's Secret parade, I want to call my friends Ben & Jerry. Or Marg and Rita.

Beyonce is somehow different. She doesn’t naturally fit alongside my traditional heroes - Dorothy Perkins, Coco Chanel, Hilary Clinton - and yet she commands my attention and respect in equal measure. Her Super Bowl performance made me think about how soft I’ve become. How soft we’ve all become? It’s so easy to quit. Or say no. Or never. Life is too busy, tiring, stressful…those three words have become the most over-used excuses in the English language. I haven’t quit sugar, lost five kilos, learned Spanish, cleaned out my bra/kitchen/present/paper drawer, written Christmas cards, memorised the dance routine from Single Ladies because I’m too stressed, tired, busy…

You know who doesn’t say that? Beyonce. She didn’t say it when her father developed her stage stamina by making her sing while running on a treadmill when she was ten. And she didn’t say it yesterday when all eyes were waiting for her to fail in New Orleans. She’s tough and that’s what I want to be this year.

Harder. Better. Faster. Stronger.

So I’m starting a new life measure called 'What Would Beyonce Do?' It’s far more modern than a resolution list. Every time I’m faced with a challenge this year I'm going to institute the Bey Barometer as motivation to get on with it. To not back down. Or walk away. There are no conditions on what constitutes the above – some days getting the kids out the door on time without complaining about it will be achievement enough - but I sincerely hope to fill 2013 with some of my many neglected ambitions: I want to play the piano again, run (yes, run) the City To Surf, camp in the back garden, learn four new words a week and teach them to the kids... I want to push myself to be excellent at whatever I turn my hand to, regardless of the task or outcome. It’s about raising the bar and starting to try my best again.

Look around, look in the mirror. I think we could all do with some toughening up, because life is not a Beyonce song...it’s a Beyonce dress rehearsal.

32 comments so far

She still managed to show little girls all across the States that no matter how big-time you get, how hard you work, how much respect you gain and how much power you attain; a sexy, skimpy leather number is still what makes it work on the big stage...

Commenter

Dr Warren Burrows

Location

Meadow Vale Heights.

Date and time

February 05, 2013, 12:13PM

+1

Commenter

Joy

Date and time

February 05, 2013, 8:27PM

Agreed! An inspiration for women (maybe), but hopefully not little girls who are being taught that following talent, the next most important requirement for success is to be provocative and seductive.... and to gyrate!

Commenter

Mama Bear

Location

Melbourne

Date and time

February 06, 2013, 6:45AM

She is just amazing. I do love that 'put a ring on it' song, not about marriage per se, but a fanastic message for young girls about respecting and valuing yourself. That's a very interesting point about so many 'role models' who make girls feel bad about themselves with their inauthentic and slightly dishonest schtick, eg. 'I do my own washing! and have no nanny (but I do have a babysitter:) look this good effortlessly and look after my man and am this skinny post-baby just through breastfeeding'.

Commenter

Em

Date and time

February 05, 2013, 12:44PM

I got exactly the opposite of that message. I felt like she suggested that women needed to get married and that getting married was the only sign that told you a man really cared.

Commenter

Joy

Date and time

February 05, 2013, 8:33PM

I also got a very different (man-hating) message from that song, and it was pretty much what turned me off her for good - but each to their own I guess.

Commenter

Jen

Location

Perth

Date and time

February 06, 2013, 1:07AM

@Joy & JenYou're reading too much into the lyrics. It's simply about girls wanting to go on a night out without getting hit on by men. The term "put a ring on it" simply means put a ring on your wedding finger so guys would assume you are married and would leave you alone.

Commenter

Kel

Location

NSW

Date and time

February 06, 2013, 8:47AM

Hey Em, I'm with you on this. Telling girls to move on from men who aren't valuing them is a pretty good message.

Beyonce isn't necessarily my cup of tea, but her consistent messages of strength, independence, respect and love are positive.

It's far too easy to be flippant and call her just another pop princess, but to keep at the top of her game (without resorting to scandal) for as long as she has is proof that the girl works hard, really hard.

If little girls are getting the message that the only way to be noticed is to be sexy....then that isn't just coming from Beyonce. It's coming at them from just about every video clip, advertising commercial, etc in media land today. At least with Beyonce, they're being given the message to be strong and sexy - not vapid.

Commenter

Tors

Location

Melbourne

Date and time

February 06, 2013, 9:04AM

I have to agree. She's one of the few celebrities that don't make me feel inadequete but inspires me to be stronger. Fit, healthy, intelligent, talented and beautiful. You either love her or hate her out of jealousy.

Commenter

Dee

Location

NSW

Date and time

February 05, 2013, 1:07PM

Most people, I think, neither hate her generally or hate her because of jealousy neither do they love her.

It's more about being incredulous to the idolatry of celebrity, image, superficiality and media.